[1] Colden was born at Spring Hill in Flushing, the family home, on April 4, 1769, in the Province of New York.

He returned to New York in 1796 and from 1798 to 1801, he was Assistant Attorney General for the First District, comprising Suffolk, Queens, Kings, Richmond and Westchester counties.

Despite having owned slaves, in 1815 he became president of the New York Manumission Society, established in 1785 to promote the abolition of slavery in the state.

He successfully contested the election of Peter Sharpe to the 17th United States Congress and served from December 12, 1821, to March 3, 1823.

His body was removed in 1843 from interment in New Jersey and moved to a receiving vault in Trinity Church Cemetery in Upper Manhattan in New York City.

[1] The vault was removed in 1845 and relocated to a prominent spot in the cemetery's Easterly Division, where it overlooks a rural intersection at Broadway and West 153rd Street.